Mankind has been cooking and preparing meals for thousands of years, each culture increasing the method and techniques of preparing meals. Cultures from all over the world provide a rich background of the various ways of preparing meals, many cooked in vessels to hold the comestibles in a secure place over a fire or an equivalent heat source. Various vessels with a variety of possibilities have been developed, such as a: pot, pan, wok, karihi, kettle, saucepan, cooking pot, coffee maker, cup, etc. The composition of these vessels has varied from metal, glass, Pyrex, ceramic, plastics, etc., where the typical user can be an adult, a child, a student, a cook, a chef, a fast food preparer, etc. Various heat sources have been developed including flames formed from natural gas, electrical conductive heating as by a coil, RF microwave, or their equivalent. Many of the comestibles held in a vessel are comprised of water, milk, fluid, wine, stock, beer, soup, stew, sauce, vegetables, fruits, meats, wheat, rice, or liquid extracts of a solid comestible being cooked. The end resulting products of using these inventive techniques presented herein can be served as meals, snacks, prepared foods, drinks, etc., for breakfast, lunch, dinner and in-between nourishment for home, restaurants, and cafeterias, etc. The method of cooking can include: boiling, simmering, stewing, steeping, infusion, steaming, smothering, poaching, or coddling.
Many of these cooking techniques require water being brought to a hot temperature so the meals can be prepared. Some quick meals are in fact not so quick. For instance, boiling eggs or preparing noodles or spaghetti requires the water in the vessel holding these comestibles to approach or reach the boiling point. Once the water is at this temperature, the cooking time starts and the meal can be prepared quickly from this time point. However, 3 or 4 minutes are typically spent waiting at the stove for the water to reach this particular time point. In many cases, this consume wastes as much as 50% of the total time spent preparing the fast meal from the very start to the very end.
In other meal preparations, the comestibles become scorched to the interior surfaces of the cooking vessel: bringing milk to the proper temperature for hot chocolate often causes scorching at least at the milk-air-surface interface alongside the vertical walls of the vessel. In some cases, the entire common surface interface between the milk and surface of the vessel becomes scorched. Considerable effort and time can be spent to remove the remnants of the scorching from the vessel.
A desirable feature of the innovative techniques helps to eliminate this concern. Microwaves ovens have helped to significantly reduce the time to prepare a meal. Microwaves heat comestibles from the inside out. Although the techniques presented in this specification are applicable to be used alongside with microwaves, these techniques also reduce the time to prepare meals in many conventional cooking technologies other than microwaves. These methods and techniques are herein presented.